


Indefinite

by loveandallthat



Series: Interesting [3]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-25
Updated: 2017-03-25
Packaged: 2018-10-10 12:40:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10437945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loveandallthat/pseuds/loveandallthat
Summary: Kent and Jack stared at each other.“Let’s go to my room,” Eric said.Jack finds out, and issues are talked through, even if not perfectly solved. Continues from Incomplete.





	

**Author's Note:**

> No beta, please let me know if you find any errors. I'd really, really appreciate it!

They didn’t text about Jack anymore.

Sure, Kent still texted Eric. They got along well enough, and Kent could talk about stuff with him that he was afraid to tell anybody else. Sure he could have, but it felt wrong. Talking to Eric, at least, was sanctioned by Jack.

He _did_ still text Jack.

He just kept them separate. Texting Jack while staunchly not talking about Eric, never bringing up Jack with Eric after that night they’d spent in the hotel room. Or the one in Kent’s apartment, or in Bitty’s room. None of those came up when talking to Jack, though he felt them fighting to be said.

That was why it took him such a long time to realize that Jack and Eric have been spending much more time together. Kent isn’t in the area very often; New York is kind of an unreasonable distance for him to claim to have casually dropped by, even when the season is over and there’s time to visit his family.

His relationship with them was mostly digital at that point. It was possible that he was psyching himself out, that Eric would want to see him--more likely--or that Jack might even want to see him--nearly impossible, if you asked Kent.

But neither one of them happened, anyway. Over the summer Kent kept himself in shape, distracting himself from overthinking about the way that Eric wouldn’t talk about how things were while he was home, despite how often he still wanted to talk about funny things his teammates were doing. Distracting himself from the fact that Jack only texted him late at night, when he was probably at his weakest. He probably regretted it in the morning.

Kent trained, and didn’t visit either of them, even when he had the time. But then Eric pointed it out to him in conversation and Kent was surprised but glad to have it mentioned. Then Eric said that he was going to Samwell a few weeks early, and that Jack was going to visit him while he was there, and Kent knew he shouldn’t. But there was something in Eric’s voice that made Kent pause, made him think that maybe he should. So he booked a flight. Last minute, he texted Eric to let him know he’d be coming, a step up in their relationship where Kent didn’t drop in on people. Eric just texted back a smiley face.

Kent got there after Jack had stayed for a night. In his imagination, Jack had stayed in Eric’s bed, but in practice that probably would have been pretty awkward after they were finally communicating post-breakup.

He also knew that Jack would expect him, that Eric wouldn’t lie to him--which meant that Jack was OK with this. That might have been the scariest part. Kent was used to dealing with a Jack who was mad at him; he’d had enough time to get used to the new version of Jack who texted him sporadically to talk about hockey and, rarely, little details of his day. The Jack who wanted to see him in person was a total stranger.

The Jack who might have heard some things about him and Eric terrified him. That Jack was also confirmed to be a future version of Jack, because according to a text from Eric, the present version of Jack only knew that they hang out, and other vague descriptions. Nothing about the kisses, or the nights together, as sleep-focused as they may have been.

He tried to shake those thoughts when he walked through the door of the frat house, when he briefly caught a glance of two people playing video games on the first level but was sufficiently distracted by Eric’s arms thrown around his neck. He accepted and even enjoyed the hug, though he was watching Jack the entire time for signs of anger. His face might have looked passive to the casual observer, but Kent caught a hint of surprise.

Kent and Jack stared at each other.

“Let’s go to my room,” Eric said.

\---

Jack and Eric sat on Eric’s bed and, though there was technically enough room for him, Kent took the chair, sitting on it backwards just to have a place to rest his arms. He thinks of Jack’s room across the hall, except it’s not Jack’s room--it’s decked out in Sharks gear, with one Falconers flag. Jack had caught him looking, so he’d looked away, but being in here, eyeing Eric’s bed, remembering sleeping in it, watching Jack sit in it like he belonged there… it was just a lot.

Then Jack wrung his hands, one of his most obvious tells, and it hit Kent all at once how uncomfortable he was, too.

Eric looked between both of them, sighed deeply, and began to speak with a surprising amount of confidence that reminded Kent he was in a room full of past or current hockey team captains.

“I really do want to be, um, friends with both of you. But Lord help me, I can’t keep avoiding talking about you to each other anymore.”

“If--Parse would just stop showing up to see me,” Jack started.

“I _did_ ,” Kent interrupted. They’d been texting, but it seemed consensual, if a bit generic. Kent had changed his _I miss yous_ to _good games_ ; _please talk to me_ became _do your teammates do this kind of dumb shit_. He was skating the surface as well as he could.

“Haven’t you been texting?” Eric asked.

“Not about this,” Jack answered awkwardly. He was still directing all of his words to Eric, turned sideways to face him instead of Kent.

“I figured you wouldn’t want to,” Kent replied, stubbornly trying to catch Jack’s eye anyway. He rested his chin on his folded arms, feeling tired, petulant.

Eric looked at him instead, of course; there was sympathy in his expression as he announced, “I’m going to go get a pie started,” and vacated his own bedroom.

“Um,” Kent mumbled. “That wasn’t very subtle.”

“No,” Jack agreed, still turned toward where Eric used to be. Then he sighed. “It’s weird,” he admitted. “You talking to Bitty.”

Bitty, Kent remembered that was his nickname. It was probably weird that he thought of him as Eric, as weird for people to call Kent by his own first name these days.

“You brought us together,” Kent pointed out. It wasn’t really an important point, but he was tired of feeling like he was taking the blame for things. “And he said you knew we were hanging out sometimes.”

Jack’s eyes widened. “I only knew you were talking.”

“Shit. Um, fuck. It really was only a few times. It wasn’t meant to be a secret or anything, but maybe Eric was trying to save me the embarrassment. I was a little fucked up a time or two.”

“About me?” Jack asked immediately, then bit his lip.

“Check your ego there, partner.” Kent immediately felt awkward, like he was lying. Because he was lying.

“Right, of course--”

“Yes, because of you,” Kent said over him. “Don’t be mad or feel weird; he really helped, OK?”

“I can’t help feeling weird,” Jack replied, but didn’t address the part about being mad.

“He really made me realize that sometimes people are just doing what they need to, to protect themselves. Doing the best they can. And that was after you dumped him, so he must have realized it on his own, somehow. That you hurt people because you can’t help it.”

Jack looked like he’d been slapped. He stood up. “It’s not like you always rubbing your success in my face, making fun of my new life, it’s not like that made me feel great,” he stammered out.

Kent rose too, a little awkwardly around the way he was sitting on the chair. He got in Jack’s face, and Jack didn’t back down at all. Abruptly the fight left Kent, and he sat where the sheets were still messed up from where Eric had been sitting, on the bed. It felt pretty much how he remembered it; he tried not to feel a sick pleasure in having been here before.

“I’m not going to do that anymore,” he promised. “I don’t even want to.”

Jack dropped back down, leaving a little more room than when he’d been sitting by Eric. “I know.”

“Are we friends?” Kent asked.

Predictably, Jack was flustered by the direct question. “I--um. I don’t think we’ve really been acting like it, no.”

“Do you want us to be?”

“Well, I don’t like what we were doing before,” Jack confessed. It really shook up Kent’s worldview; he’d thought that avoiding and blaming Kent had worked pretty well for Jack.

“What about what we’re doing now?” Kent continued. Prompting Jack when he was being difficult was a hard habit to break.

“It’s good,” Jack breathed, and Kent felt his whole body relax, had to fight to stay sitting up straight. “But sometimes… there’s nobody else I can talk to when too many shitty homophobic comments get to me. Bitty understands that, but not when his career is on the line, his entire life.”

In a way, Kent thought, they were all risking their lives by feeling like this about each other, about other men.

“We could do that. We can talk about that kind of stuff; we can be friends for real. Like back in the juniors, before--well, you know.”

“I don’t know if I’ll be good at that,” Jack whispered. Kent let it hang there for a while. It made him feel vaguely sick, a little mean.

“So there’s no bro code between us yet, then,” Kent said. Would Jack catch on; did he even know what that meant?

“Why would you say that?” Jack asked, but then it appeared to dawn on him. “Are you interested in Bitty?”

Kent grinned, even as Jack’s face progressed from shock to something more like fear. He really, really wanted to be at a point where he didn’t feel a little vindictive toward Jack Zimmermann. He was working on it.

“That’s why you’ve been hanging out with him,” Jack accused him.

Kent took some offense. He wasn’t exactly desperately seeking someone to sleep with; if he was, he’d have a pretty easy time, but he was more interested in something more serious, when possible.

“I’m hanging out with him because he’s nice and funny and we get along,” Kent corrected, and Jack’s face relaxed. “I’ve been making out with him because of all that, and because he’s too fucking cute.”

Jack searched his face for a long moment; Kent basked in it guiltily. “You’re serious,” he realized. Kent nodded. “That’s what this is,” Jack muttered. “That’s why I’m here, so you can tell me about it, rub it in my face.”

“Eric invited you!” Kent pointed out, throwing his hands up in exasperation.

“It’s not going to work,” Jack barrelled on. “I don’t care what you guys do.” He stood up and walked out the door, down the stairs and out the front door, closing it softly behind him.

Eric still noticed that something was wrong and chased after him. Kent dropped down at the top of the stairs, elbows on his knees, overlooking what appeared to be an already cooling pie, even though they hadn’t been talking for very long. What the hell?

From his vantage point, he could hear but not see the video game playing that was going on somewhere on the first floor. Apparently someone was on a winning streak; Kent wondered what that was like.

It took another hour before Eric got back, and Kent had already gone back to his room, messing around on his phone while holding it above his face. He kept imagining himself dropping it, but it didn’t happen. Eric came back in, though, looking much more drained than he had earlier. He had the pie with him, and two forks. A few pieces were missing.

“You’re going to drop that on your face,” he warned Kent, and Kent set his phone facedown on the nightstand. “Blueberry pie?” he offered, holding it out. Kent reached for a fork as he moved to a seated position, back to the wall. Eric climbed up to join him, close enough that their arms were pressed together, and it was like Kent could breathe again. He took a bite of the pie and moaned.

Eric went red, but he laughed. “That’s the best kind of review.”

Kent couldn’t fight a smile, while they both continued eating in a completely casual way. He could imagine his nutritionist complaining, even during the off-season.

“Jack’s not really mad at you,” Eric announced.

Kent swallowed, ran his tongue over his teeth. “Sure he is.”

“Not really,” Eric argued, but quietly, nicely. His voice washed over Kent and kept him calm. “He’s mad at himself--probably about both of us.” Eric looked guilty, like he hadn’t meant to bring it up.

“He should be.”

“Maybe,” Eric answered diplomatically. “But maybe he just needs both of us as friends?”

Kent thought back to what Jack had said, pretty much that. “He’s not going to want us around if we keep--you know.” He couldn’t even tease Eric for how red he got at that, because he felt the heat on his own face, knew it might even be worse.

“It’ll take time. And _kindness_ ,” Eric stressed.

“Fine, fine, I’ll do my best,” Kent acquiesced, finding himself unable to turn down that tone of voice, and not really wanting to anyway.

“As long as he’s still talking to both of us, I think this will work out.”

“Have you always been this optimistic?” Kent grumbled.

Eric’s expression shifted. “No,” he answered, and Kent could feel a story behind that, but he didn’t want to push.

He tried to get the conversation back on track. “So you want to keep talking to him… and to me?” Kent prompted.

“Are you asking if I want to keep seeing you?” Eric asked. His accent came out a little stronger, and Kent bit back a chirp about it that might remind him to reign it in; it was adorable.

“Yeah,” Kent confirmed, shameless. There were so many reasons not to want to do this, but he didn’t want to give into any of them when the reasons _to_ do it were so strong, so tempting.

“Then yes,” Eric said. He didn’t really need to; Kent could tell from the look on his face. He was helpless against it, smiling back immediately, but he had to make sure.

“What would you have done if Jack wasn’t OK with it? Or, I mean, if you didn’t think he’d get there eventually?”

“I knew he wouldn’t. He’s not that type of person.”

“He was with me,” Kent said softly, just for Eric’s ears, wishing he didn’t have to hear it himself.

But Eric was shaking his head. “On the surface, maybe. But would you have liked him so much if he was like that deep down?”

Yes, Kent thought, absolutely. It hit him then that they had either loved two versions of Jack, or loved him completely differently, but Kent loved his faults and loved him all the way from the top to his lowest point; Eric didn’t even know him then. But he was envious of Eric, only loving people who are kind and good; Kent’s love was nowhere near that healthy. He was lucky that his feelings had set their heart on Eric this time.

“If he’d begged you to take him back,” Kent asked, unable to keep the words in no matter how cruel it was to test people’s feelings like that, “would you have said yes?”

Eric shook his head again. “No. I may be inexperienced, and I might understand why Jack did what he did, but I still have to protect myself from situations I know will hurt me again.”

“You think I’m safe?” Kent asked, incredulously. That would have been a first for him.

“I’m willing to risk it.”

The pie was still in Eric’s lap; Kent reached over to move it onto the desk, stretching as he did so. He probably looked ridiculous, though Eric wasn’t laughing at him when they met in the middle for a kiss. He was so, so into Eric, but pushing it any further felt wrong, like the only reason that they’d never moved past kissing was that Jack was in the way, as if they were waiting for him to know.

It seemed on some level like they were in agreement, because Eric didn’t push either, though Kent could tell he was hard, too.

That was revealed to be the right decision when they had to let Jack back in after he’d walked off his mood, though Kent was careful not to call it that. Jack slept in his old room and didn’t make a big point of the obvious fact that Kent and Eric were staying in Eric's room together, which was reassuring. As much as he still wanted to push Jack’s buttons, it sounded even better to get along with him--he’d wanted that all along, but tended to revert to the former whenever it didn’t work out.

So they all slept in the same house, thinking about the same things. Kent was on his back with Eric sprawled all over him, and Jack was in a room that taunted him with a different team, but they were connected more through experiences.

There was no way that Eric wasn’t thinking it, too. One day Jack would be ready, and he might want one of them; they might have to reassess, readjust. But in the more secret recesses of his mind, Kent couldn’t help but imagine that one day he might want both of them, that the three of them could be something more together.

If neither of those ever happened, though, he could be happy with Eric as long as he was allowed to.

**Author's Note:**

> Please comment anything! Criticism is fine. Chatting is great. Requests, I'll take 'em.
> 
> I didn't plan this to go in such an OT3 direction but I think that even from the start I set it up so there was no other choice. If I write a fourth installment, it'll solidify that instead of hinting at possibilities, but right now I like it better like this.
> 
> Find me on tumblr as [loveandallthat](http://loveandallthat.tumblr.com/)! I take prompts for tons of fandoms and pairings.


End file.
